Child Nutrition Services

Fueling Student Learning With Nutritious Food

Our mission is to provide quality nutritious meals that support the growth and development of our students to fuel their learning. Our cafeterias continue to meet challenging federal nutrition standards for school meals and snacks, ensuring that they are healthy and well balanced and include fresh, local foods.

For questions regarding payments, account balances or invoices, please contact Janet Murray at 507.663.0618 or Stephany Stromme at 507.645.3432. Please place calls to the kitchen managers before 10:30 a.m. or after 12:30 p.m.

What’s Happening

This will be the 10th year of our Farm-to-School initiative, with local products indicated by a MN logo on the menus. All schools serve both hot and cold vegetables daily to offer a wide variety of choices.

Burrito Line

We will be offering a “Build Your Own Burrito” line at the high school and middle school on Wednesdays located in the salad bar line. Students have the option of creating a whole grain, soft-shell burrito or a burrito bowl with a variety of fresh vegetable toppings.

Grill line

We will be offering a Raider Nation Grill’d Greats line daily at the high school and middle school. This line, previously known as the hot ala carte area, will allow students to choose an entree from a two week menu rotation and select a variety of fresh fruits and veggies to make a complete meal.

Natural Breakfast Cereal

Child Nutrition Services has joined a Food Focus group that is looking at ways to incorporate more foods with cleaner labels. As part of this initiative many of our cereals and hot breakfast items will have no artificial colors and no artificial flavorings.

Smart Snacks

We continue to make annual changes to our snack and ala carte products to meet the USDA competitive foods final rule and the Healthier US School Challenge guidelines. We will continue to make changes to be in compliance with guidelines and to provide nutritional alternatives to supplement our main menu.

Apply for Free/Reduced Lunch

Free or reduced price meals are available for students whose family qualifies. The appropriate form must be completed each school year and submitted to Child Nutrition Services for review and approval. Applications are available online, at each principal’s office, each school kitchen and are mailed to each household in August. If an application is needed in a different language please contact Child Nutrition Services.

Child Nutrition Services will review applications on a timely basis, however, it may take 7-10 days for an application to be reviewed. A response will be sent to the parents/guardian by email. If no email is available with the family account then a letter will be mailed indicating approval or denial of benefits. Please save this letter as proof of benefits for other school programs. If a letter is not available a WAIVER OF CONFIDENTIALITY form will need to be completed before Child Nutrition Services can release your child’s meal eligibility status. Benefits from the previous school year will be carried over until October 16, 2018. Applications may be completed at any time throughout the year, however, any family that has not reapplied by October 16 will be changed to full-priced meals until a new application is received to determine meal eligibility. Families receiving MFIP, Food Stamps or FDPIR and enrolled in Northfield Public Schools by June 15 for the following year will be directly certified by the State of Minnesota to receive free meals and may not need to complete an application. Payment will be required for any meals purchased prior to the approval of the application.

In 2014, Minnesota was the second state to pass into law that all children who qualify for free or reduced priced meals will receive meals for free. Minnesota continues to lead with these efforts to eliminate childhood hunger and ensure that we provide children the food they need to be successful.

Households qualifying for free and reduced price meals for the 2018-19 school year will continue to receive breakfast & lunch at no charge. The bill referenced above also included the financial resources to provide all kindergartners with free breakfast regardless of their household eligibility.

Online Applications

Families can now complete the educational benefits application online through Family Access. If you wish to complete your application online, you must first login to Family Access. After logging in, click the Food Service button located on the left side of the screen and select a child’s name. Click the applications tab and follow the prompts to complete the application.

Payments & Pricing

Students and staff may purchase meals and food items by submitting a payment to their meal account or by making a payment at the time of service. New students and staff are assigned an individual meal account with a 4-digit personal identification number (PIN). Returning students use the same PIN as in the previous year.

Families may pay for meals using cash, check or our online payment systems. Checks may be made out to Northfield Public Schools and must include the student’s first and last name and personal identification number (PIN). All schools have payment envelopes and collection boxes placed in the Child Nutrition area for receipt of payments. Cash payments will be accepted in a sealed envelope with the student and parent’s first and last name, PIN, and the amount of payment written on the outside of the envelope. Payments may also be mailed to Northfield Public Schools, Child Nutrition Office, 1400 Division Street South, Northfield, MN 55057.

Online Payment

Payments using a debit/credit card or a checking account can be made online through Family Access.

Family Access Payment Steps

Go to northfieldschools.org and click on Payments or click the button below. You can either login to Family Access to continue or apply for a Family Access account if you do not have one.

After you have logged into Family Access, you will need to click on the Food Service tab to the left of the screen.

This will bring up your child/children. Click “Make a Payment” (next to the child’s name),

Next click update payment amount for the student.

Enter the amount and click on update cart.

Complete these steps for each additional child or if your order is complete click the “Pay with Vendor” button located on the top right of current page.

Click “Go to check out” button.

Set up an account with RevTrak using your email address.

Continue to follow prompts to complete billing and payment information.

Account Balance Statements

Parents or guardians are responsible for monitoring their student’s meal account balances. Child Nutrition Services will make every reasonable effort to notify families of the need for a meal account payment. We utilize an automated school messenger system to contact families about low and negative balances using both phone calls and email notifications.

Family Access will allow you to view meal account balances, payments and purchases. Statements will be made available upon request or can be printed using Family Access. To request a statement, parents, guardians and staff may contact the kitchen at each school or the district office. We will make every reasonable effort to contact you if your students account balance is running low or negative. Please review the following procedure for any questions that you may have concerning your students account balance.

Refunds

Balances remaining on accounts at the end of the school year will be automatically carried forward when school reopens. Balances follow students to their next building assignment. Meal purchases should be monitored to maintain a positive lunch balance. Refund requests must be submitted in writing and received by Child Nutrition Services no more than 5 days after the last day of school. A check will be issued in the amount of the refund. No cash refunds will be made.

Federal regulation requires that students be offered five food components comprising the lunch meal. Students may choose three, four or five lunch items based on their preferences. A student is required to include at least 1/2 cup fruit or vegetable as one of their components. Students will be offered four food components at breakfast and must choose at least three. Federal regulations require meals to be priced as a complete unit and students must pay the full price even if they did not choose the complete meal.

Elementary Student Meal

Main line, salad bar or pre-made salad and cold sandwich option are all priced the same.

Breakfast

Lunch

Both

Full Price

$1.55

$2.50

$4.05

Free/Reduced

Free

Free

Free

Secondary Student Meal

Main line, salad bar line, sandwich line and grilled line meals are all priced the same.

Breakfast

Lunch

Both

Full Price

$1.55

$2.65

$4.20

Free/Reduced

Free

Free

Free

Staff / Adult / Visitor / Second Meal

Parents, guardians and other family members may eat with students during their meal time. All visitors are required to sign in at the school office. Staff meals, visitor meals and second student meals are priced higher because Child Nutrition Services does not receive any federal or state reimbursement for those meals, as we do for a student’s first meal.

Milk is included in the price of a breakfast and lunch meal. Students who take milk only or an extra milk at meals will be charged $0.50 per carton.

Milk Break Program (Grades K-5)

Students in grades K-5 may have the opportunity to drink milk during their morning or afternoon break. The cost for grades 1-5 is $0.50 per day and is deducted weekly from the student’s lunch account. The classroom teacher determines if their class will participate in the milk break program on an annual basis.

The milk break program is tracked daily with classroom checklists, and the milk for the week is charged to the student’s account the Monday following the prior week. For example if you see a charge for “3 milk breaks” on your student’s account, that indicates that your child participated in milk break on three days the prior week.

This program is optional and not part of the educational meal benefits program. Each student who participates will be charged the same amount of $0.50. Kindergarten students will pay a flat fee of $20 for the year unless they qualify for free or reduced priced meals; then there is no cost.

Students at all the elementary schools will have the opportunity to sign up to receive a healthy snack every school day for a total cost of $65 a year. It is a way to offer students and families the opportunity to select fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy products and other nutritionally sound choices for a minimal price to encourage students to make good eating decisions for optimal health. The program is completely an optional choice for all families, and is not part of the educational benefits application that provides school meal benefits to families who qualify.

Sign-up Forms

Menus and Mealtimes

Northfield Public Schools participates in the National School Breakfast and School Lunch Program. This program makes available a nutritious breakfast and lunch daily at a reasonable cost. One half pint of milk is included with every meal. Menus are planned using the USDA Menu Planning Guidelines.

Main Menus

Alternate meal choices

Students have the option to select the alternative meal lines if they do not like the featured meal on the menu. Pricing is the same as a mainline meal.

Cold Sandwich

A cold sandwich meal is available including whole wheat turkey or whole wheat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. These meals include a fruit, a vegetable and a milk.

Salad

A full salad bar is available daily at Bridgewater Elementary. A variety of entree salads are available daily at Greenvale Park Elementary and Sibley Elementary. The salad meal includes a fruit choice, a whole grain bread choice and a milk.

Main Menus

Alternate meal choices

Students have the option to select the alternative meal lines if they do not like the featured meal on the menu. Pricing is the same as a mainline meal.

COLD SANDWICH

A variety of pre-made whole grain sub sandwiches and whole grain wraps are available daily. The meal includes a fruit, a vegetable and a milk.

SALAD

A full salad bar is available daily at the high school. The meal includes a fruit choice, a whole grain bread choice and a milk.Salad of the Day:Monday: Chicken Taco Tuesday: Buffalo Chicken Wednesday: Burrito Bar Thursday: Crispy Chicken Friday: BBQ Chicken

Child Nutrition Services may honor dietary restrictions due to allergies or intolerances with the proper documentation from a medical authority on file. The form for allergies and other special dietary needs is available below. For students with a lactose intolerance, a lactose reduced milk product will be provided at no extra charge on the written request of the parent or physician. Please contact your school nurse or the Child Nutrition Director if you have questions.

Wellness Policy

In 2017, Northfield Public Schools developed a wellness policy based on guidelines of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The policy includes changes that will apply or have already been applied to food served by Child Nutrition Services. It also includes food used in classrooms for rewards and celebrations and food sold by organizations for fundraisers during the school day.

Parent Newsletters

Catering Requests

Child Nutrition Services offers a variety of catering options for events during the school year. We are a great choice to provide breakfast, lunch, dinner or a snack for any size group at a reasonable cost. Please fill out a catering services request form and contact the kitchen manager with questions.